Times of India does a Rambo, claims to reach 1 billion people

New Delhi. The Times of India, one of the leading newspapers of India, has claimed that its circulation numbers inside the country have reached 1 billion mark.

“Times of India lands in Indian homes, reaches out to 1 billion Indians” claimed a report published 3 days back. The headline was shared and celebrated by many ToI fans, but questions were raised soon after.

Times of India: now available on stands, but can’t take a stand.

“How can an English paper reach 90% of the Indian population when English is spoken by less than 10% of the literate population?” wondered an expert on statistics, linguistics, literacy, newspaper distribution, geography, and politics of India.

Open letters to the ToI editors were written and an online petition was started asking for clarification on the number claimed by the newspaper.

It’s not known if such letters and petitions had any effect, but a follow-up story was published in the newspaper that said – Forget ToI, even Rambo can’t reach 1 billion people in India, experts say.

The second report blamed spin doctors of the newspaper distribution market for the 1 billion figure, but didn’t explain why the claim was made and published by the paper in the first place.

An additional article was published in the same newspaper with elaborate mathematics to explain why 1 billion figure mark could be impossible to attain by any publication in India, even by Faking News.

“Chhod na yaar,” a Times of India official said when asked how the 1 billion number was arrived at.